Love it, hate it, or think its irrelevant, social media cannot be ignored in today’s web-based business landscape. And when you put time, money and effort into a business activity on the internet, it is pointless to fail to measure its results. Yet, a recent survey indicated that almost 50% of marketers utilizing social media channels for internet marketing or search engine optimization purposes don’t use web analytics to check that their efforts are heading in the right direction. Today we look at why social media has become an integral part of the internet marketing landscape, and why web analytics tools need to be applied to your social media marketing efforts as consistently as they are on your main website.
Social Media in Statistics
There are plenty of incredibly impressive statistics about social media; around 500 million people have Facebook accounts, the average person in Western countries spends up to 10 hours a week on social media, and even the niche social sites on the internet enjoy considerable traffic. Here’s what we know about social media, internet marketing, and what other companies are doing:
- Most companies (around two othirds) focus their social media efforts on the company as a whole
- Most companies carry out social media and viral marketing activities in house; only a small minority outsource this aspect of search engine optimization or internet marketing.
- Around 65% of marketers are using video content, either on their own websites or on Youtube.
- 85% of marketers surveyed are using a Twitter account
- 65% have a Facebook fan page for their company.
- 50% have created a LinkedIn Group or blog for their organization
However, one of the most significant statistics is that around 50% of marketers do not measure the ROI of these channels using web analysis tools, even though it is likely that a much higher percentage already use web analytics of some sort on their main corporate website.
Why is social media monitoring and measurement important?
Social media monitoring and measurement are two separate activities, both important for their own reasons.
Social media monitoring gives you qualitative insight into what’s being said about your company online. It is almost as if you are a fly on the wall in the rooms of every couple or group that is talking about your organization, and can record all of the conversations simultaneously. People will say things to each other that they wouldn’t bother saying directly to the company (even on social media sites) or putting on a feedback form, and this can be a valuable adjunct to your internet marketing and viral marketing campaigns.
Social media measurement is the only way you can justify your company’s spending on this form of internet marketing. Every business activity must eventually justify its own cost, even those that may be initially assumed to be ‘intangible’ or ‘unmeasureable’. Additionally, social media evolves at a rate of knots, and measurement using web analytics means you can ‘fail fast’, rather than spending many months doing the wrong thing.
Web analytics quickly becomes a necessity for all companies that implement it on their main website; once you begin using social media analysis tools like Webtrends’ Facebook Analytics, you’ll discover just how vital it is.
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